In That Order
by I Need a Thesaurus
Summary: Look into the lives of Champions Red and Blue before and after their rise. ONE: It had always started with painkillers


Antidepressant (n) – a drug used to relieve mental depression

PART ONE

/

It always starts with painkillers.

When Lilia had given birth to her son it was under the normal procedure, it had been an extremely painful process for her because they had to cut in really deep for the baby to come out. It also did not help that through most of the pregnancy she slept on the floor instead of a bed and woke up with a blow to the head.

She didn't even realize she was in the hospital until she saw several lights and faces staring at her and telling her to push. She knew her husband was not there, probably went to play mahjong with his other friends or something. So for the next seven hours she had screamed, pushed, cried and prayed to the gods if they would just kill her just to stop the pain.

By the time her baby had come out she was unconscious and did not wake up until 24 hours had passed. When Lilia did wake up she was greeted by a plump nurse who asked if she was alright. She was about to ask if she could see her son when her husband opened the door asking the same thing.

The nurse was taken aback and stood silent for a few moments, when her husband barked at the nurse a second time she had no choice but to follow.

It was only a few moments later when the nurse came back to the room, this time she held something wrapped in her hands, though there seemed to be something off about the nurse.

They would later learn that the nurse had been scared.

Well who wouldn't be, the baby had red eyes.

At the sight of this Lilia's husband screamed at the sight of his son. He started cursing incoherently and shouted at Lilia for screwing up with another man.

Though Lilia didn't expect it she knew that the baby was no devil's spawn, he had just inherited from her own father which she was quite grateful.

When they came home with the baby her husband had threatened to kill it for the first week. Whenever her husband tried Lilia would be there ready to defend the child, it hadn't been easy as she was not only up against the man but also against his Jolteon.

It was a good thing the Pokémon refused to attack the baby in the last minute when it started to play with its fur.

The death threats had stopped but that just meant the abuse had escalated. She was dragged down the stairs every morning when she would breastfeed the child first than make him breakfast.

So when she named her child she was pretty sure she was high on painkillers.

At first she just took the pills to lessen the pain, she then took stronger ones because the first ones weren't effective. She had started smoking when the baby kept crying and she needed to stay awake to put it asleep or her husband might shoot him again.

It was only when her son was around two and she found her husband punch the boy after he broke a pipe. It had been easier to do after all, she didn't have that much to bring just a few clothes for her and her son and a couple of money she got from selling Magicarp eggs and Oddish in fairs.

Throughout the bus ride out of Saffron to Cerulean she had smoked two packets due to anxiety, she didn't want her son to smell the smoke so she usually did it in the back and let some young girl or old man watch him. Little did Lilia know her son would actually take up her smoking habits later.

When they had reached Vermillion she bought more cigarettes and another bus ride to Pewter since her husband might track them down. The several bus rides had been quite surreal for Lilia, nobody seemed to judge her son's eye color all of them thinking he was albino or some sort, almost all of them said he was quite a good looking boy for his age.

Though she remembered one time, it was probably when they were in a diner in Cerulean when a woman asked for the boy's name. Lilia was about to tell the old woman that he didn't know how to talk yet when she was taken aback by his response.

He said his name was Red.

Later when Lilia asked why he said so, knowing full well while she was high she named him after the bastard. The boy simply pointed at his eyes then went back to looking at the scenery out his window.

Since then she had called him Red.

/

Red was around three when they had finally settled down in Pallet town, a sleepy town that was far away from Saffron. By now his mother had moved from smoking cigarettes and was working harder than ever in order to afford a simple house for shelter, clothes and food.

It was in here where she had made acquaintance of Professor Oak who saw Lilia carrying several boxes Machoke usually carry. The man had offered to provide them financial support but Lilia had denied, instead she wanted the Professor to educate her son.

A couple of years had passed and they had managed to stand on their own feet. Though Red knew there were times whenever he went to get water in the middle of the night he would see his mother on her rocking chair a cigarette in one hand and a picture of her ex in another. He didn't know if he should be mad at his mom for smoking or for his mom smoking for his dick of a father.

He knew he could never fill in whatever void her mother had between her father, but he didn't expect that she would start looking around for someone to do so. He was a good son, though he wasn't very vocal about his emotions he always tried his best to show his mom that it was ok if it were the only two of them.

So when Gary Oak told him one day in school his mother had a new boyfriend Red couldn't help but throw a tantrum that night. And alas that was how his little brother Fire came to be, but Red had to give the guy credit at least he didn't hurt his mother (physically she was still an emotional wreck as ever).

He remembered one night he had just put Fire to sleep after the baby had cried for almost an hour and neither of the boys were getting any sleep that time. He found his mother on the rocking chair smoking and drinking out of a beer bottle. That was the time Red pretty much cursed the woman for all she was worth, at first Lilia turned to see who was yelling at her.

Lilia suddenly smiled and rose from her rocking chair and tipsily approached her son. But in her mind she was not going to her son, she was approaching her husband. Lilia wrapped her arms around the boy and whispered the bastard's name right on his ear.

This was the only time Red had pushed his mother off him, it was quite hard as she fell to the floor and dropped her bottle making it roll of somewhere. Red had just stared at her mother when she started to laugh in her tears.

/

When Red had left for his Pokémon journey Lilia was at first distraught since he did not even say goodbye to her when he left. Heck the person who told her who left was Fire because when she asked where her brother was he pointed at the large grass area leading out of Pallet town.

She quickly confronted the Professor about it, saying she did not remember signing a permit. Much to her surprise the Professor had shown her the permit and there in her sloppy drunken handwriting was her signature.

She had cried nonstop that night cursing herself for falling into her vices and neglecting her children. It was then that she vowed to be a better mother to Fire, she knew her son didn't hate her but he never really did call her that much.

When she begged Professor Oak to call his Pokedex it was around a week after he left. Red did answer it and Lilia lectured him through the entire time, when she was done he did not say anything for a while she thought he had hung up. He then asked if he could talk to Fire which she allowed, she never knew what the two brothers talked about. And that was the last time she heard her son's voice outside of the TV screen.

Her son had become Champion by the end of the year and the whole time while watching his match against Lance, with his little Pikachu against the Champion's giant Dragonite, she wondered if Red's father knew if that boy was her son.

Then she asked herself, was that even hers.

/

PART TWO

/

Cynthia had given birth to her first child under caesarian, she was only walking down the stairs when she suddenly blacked out. She had opened her eyes to see the father of her son with his rival, Pikachu and a couple of Nurse Joys wheeling her to the ER.

After giving birth she had problems with sleeping so she took sleeping pills along with the painkillers used to stop her abdominal pain. When Red had found out about this he just used his Drowzy on her so she wouldn't take the pills, which seemed more effective.

But when Red left for long periods of time she found herself downing more pills at night for her postpartum depression. She knew it would happen to her at some point after she gave birth but she didn't think it would hit her that hard.

Whenever she looked at her son she would not believe that such a child had come out of her, he was just too perfect. She would look at the baby whenever it was asleep and she couldn't help but cry every time she looked at it.

It always felt that the child had taken a piece from her but she never blamed the baby for that, he had no fault it the matter. It did not help that Red would usually be gone leaving her to her own demons, but she couldn't blame him either. He knew her to be a strong woman both mentally and physically, and she needed to put that façade upfront for him.

Because if she didn't he might leave her like what he did to his mother.

/

The reason Red smoked was because he knew he had fucked up, twice.

The first time was with Lilia, his own mother. He had been angry at her for loving his father and drowning herself in alcohol and smoke to try to forget about him. While Red tried to put Fire to sleep and make them breakfast when his mother was too weak from whatever she smoked the previous night.

He should have known better of course, she had fought for him when he was still a baby. She still bore the marks on her hands from the several times her father had beaten her. The scar from that Jolteon's thunder attack was still on her back and was fresh as ever.

It was her mother who took him away from that man and from a bleak future of growing up with that man. It was her mother who hugged him at night when it was too cold in the bus and she was still warm despite the fact she was shivering herself.

It was her mother who provided him with a brother he never wanted but needed. He would have been a total sociopath if it weren't for Fire, whom he could actually talk to without being judged and he was glad the boy felt the same for him.

And what did he to do her? Cursed her, blamed her for everything and outright ignored her as soon as he left for his Pokémon journey. He was surprised neither Fire nor his mother hated him for that because right now he would willingly go back to Mt. Silver and jump from its peak.

And then there was Cynthia . . .

She was no doubt one of the strongest trainers he had ever had a battle against, he was even stronger than Blue and Ethan combined. If it wasn't for his Pikachu and Mega-Charizard he would have been done for.

He also respected that girl outside of the battle ring, her interest in mythology intrigued him and made her more interesting to talk to. She also had the tendency to go out of her way to make him say at least something in the League meetings, especially if it led him to cursing.

What he liked about Cynthia was that she was a strong independent woman who didn't give a fuck about anything and just rolled with it. Neither of them remembered when they had started sleeping with each other whenever they were in the same city and they didn't bother debating on who even initiated the whole thing.

Their relationship had started to get shaky when Cynthia had called to tell him she was pregnant. She didn't ask him step in to be the dad, she just informed him so he would know and was giving the choice to do so.

He had put it upon himself to take care of his child and the woman carrying it because it was the right thing to do and he didn't want to be like Fire's father or his own father.

To avoid any complications Cynthia had hid her pregnancy from her family and spent most of her time in her villa in Undella town. Red didn't bother to inform anyone but Blue and Fire eventually found out just in time for the baby's due.

Red was expecting mood swings from Cynthia during the pregnancy but all he got was a very hyper woman, like she would laugh at even some corny joke of Caitlin's as louder than those crowds you see in comedy bars.

By the time she had given birth though the scales had tipped. She wouldn't sleep, she was always in pain, which was strange because the doctor said she was physically fine when she went for check-ups.

The mistake he did though was that he left her when she was in what could be the hardest moment in her life. Sure she may be headstrong and independent but the delivery of their baby wasn't easy, the delivery had been all so painful he could still hear the echoing of her screams. Also he had practically isolated her when she was pregnant, he was her only companion through the entire ordeal and now even he was gone.

It did not help that she did not want to show it, and he didn't ask her whatever she was really feeling.

He did know that something was going wrong when she took in a bit too much before sleeping. Which was why he used a Drowzy on her, he didn't let the Pokémon use Hypnosis on her though seeing as the attack might have been too strong seeing as she had just given birth.

Though when he recently went 'home' (if that was what they would even call it) Cynthia seemed a bit paler than before, her eyes was almost the same color as his, she tired easily and she had the tendency to drop objects a lot.

She was wearing a lot of baggy clothes to despite the fact it was quite hot. She didn't seem talkative either as before, heck it was actually Red who started conversations that time and she usually answered with one word answers. The woman wouldn't even eat making Pikachu eat her food most of the time.

One night though he had awoken to the crying of their child, he turned around and saw Cynthia wasn't there. He had assumed she went to soothe the child but when Pikachu had started running towards him with a panicked cry, he automatically got up.

When he came to the nursery the baby was crying inside it's cot he rushed over to his child and quickly carried it trying to soothe it. During this though Pikachu kept pulling on his pant and pointed at the other room next door.

While carrying the still crying child he had followed the yellow rodent to the veranda. In there was a moving rocking chair, the trainer slowly went towards it and in there he saw her.

She seemed to be asleep her hands on the armrest of the chair. What caught his eye was what she held on her right hand.

He quickly snatched the object from her hand, he knew it.

It had always started with painkillers.

/

 **A/N: This was actually an alphabet challenge and it seems I might have shifted far from the word I was supposed to base it off from.**

 **In my head I think Red from the original games and Fire from FireRed and LeafGreen are brothers because they look too different to be one person.**

 **Also in my head trainers are 16 because it's more logical and factual.**

 **Review.**


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